The INTREPID Symposium: Unlocking Consciousness through Adversarial Collaborations
Date: July 10-11, 2025
Location: Atlantis Aquila Hotel, Heraklion, Greece
As INTREPID nears its finale, we are bringing together the consciousness science community for a high-impact symposium to unveil our findings and those obtained by the other four other adversarial collaborations funded by the Templeton World Charity Foundation, offering a rare opportunity to see how competing theories stand up to scrutiny.
Beyond the results, thought leaders in the field will explore the broader implications of these projects through dynamic talks and panel discussions. We will debate key questions such as:
• Can adversarial collaborations truly test theories of consciousness?
• How do the findings from different projects fit together?
• What does this mean for the future of consciousness science?
Join us at the INTREPID Symposium for two days of cutting-edge discussion, debate, and discovery! The event will take place at the Atlantis Aquila Hotel in Heraklion on July 10-11, 2025, immediately following the 2025 ASSC meeting.
Don’t miss this chance to witness—and shape—the future of consciousness science!
Registration will be open from March 5nd until June 29th
Registration costs are
€ 50 regular; € 25 for undergraduate/graduate students
Fees includes refreshments and lunch for two days.
Preliminary Program
Day 1 : July 10
Session 1 : INTREPID
| Start | End | Speaker | Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0900 | 0930 | Cyriel Pennartz University of Amsterdam, NL | Welcome address Introduction to INTREPID | ||
| 0930 | 1000 | Umberto Olcese University of Amsterdam, NL | Do unresponsive neurons in the visual cortex contribute to visual perception? | ||
| 1000 | 1030 | Lars Muckli University of Glasgow, UK | Size and distance estimates around the blindspot – testing theories of consiousness | ||
| 1030 | 1100 | Coffee break | |||
| 1100 | 1130 | Andrew Haun University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA | Testing distance perception across cortical visual field defects | ||
| 1130 | 1200 | Jonathan Robinson Monash University, AUS | The role of Active Inference in Conscious Awareness | ||
| 1200 | 1330 | Lunch break | |||
Session 2 : ARC
| Start | End | Speaker | Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1330 | 1400 | Liad Mudrik Tel Aviv University, IL | Cogitate behind the scenes: lessons learned | ||
| 1400 | 1430 | Fanis Panagiotaropoulos University of Athens, GR | Refining Our Understanding of Consciousness Through Adversarial Collaborations | ||
| 1430 | 1500 | Coffee break | |||
| 1500 | 1530 | Biyu He New York University, USA | Neural mechanisms of conscious visual perception | ||
| 1530 | 1600 | Axel Cleeremans Free University of Brussels, BE | ETHoS: A brief overview | ||
| 1600 | 1630 | Coffee break | |||
| 1630 | 1800 | Anil Seth, Athena Demertzi, Sascha Fink, Johannes Kleiner | Panel discussion on ARC projects: what have we learned about consciousness and consciousness science? | ||
Day 2 : July 11
Session 3 : The future of the field
| Start | End | Speaker | Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0900 | 0930 | Hal Blumenfeld Yale University, USA | A pulse of arousal ignites perception across modalities | ||
| 0930 | 1000 | Lucia Melloni Max Planck Institute, DE | Adversarial collaborations – A tribute to Daniel Kahneman | ||
| 1000 | 1030 | Virginia Cooper TWCF, Bahamas | A Funder’s Perspective on the Future of the Field | ||
| 1030 | 1100 | Coffee break | |||
| 1100 | 1130 | David Chalmers New York University, USA | The problems of consciousness: where are we now and where are we going? | ||
| 1130 | 1300 | All speakers + Dawid Potgieter | Panel discussion: The future of consciousness science | ||
| 1300 | 1400 | Lunch | |||
Organization
Cyriel Pennartz
University of Amsterdam
Director
Umberto Olcese
University of Amsterdam
Co-Director
Reinder Dorman
University of Amsterdam
Project Manager
Contact
This project was made possible through the support of a grant from the
Templeton World Charity Foundation
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